I've done RPG's for a long time, & like any other gamer I have my stories...some stand out more than others.

When FASA first released Star Trek we got a group together & play-tested it, around a pool table.

We played the original cast, I played Scotty (of course), & back then the ship charts were pretty neat.

One of the guys didn't watch the show & knew virtually NOTHING about Trek (he played Chekov).

During the game he got flustered during a particularly intence ship-to-ship combat started flailing about & knocked all the game pieces off of my engineering control sheet, while shouting "what are you people talking about".

Captain Kirk then shouted at me "Scotty we need more power to the weapons". (If you're not familiar with this game the sheets are manipulated like the control panels on the Enterprise & the Engineer has to alot power to the other players)

I honestly didn't think about my responce, but I replied in my best Scots brouge..."Give me a minute Captain we're picking the pieces up down here!"

The GM, a rather serious individual, literally fell out of his chair he was laughing so hard; while it took some time to restore order it remains one of my favorite Trek RPG moments.

I just relayed this story some days ago, so it's relatively fresh in my mind.

I was playing in a Marvel Super Heroes RPG, as Magni, the son of Thor. He possessed, by this point in the game's timeline, all of Thor's cosmic powers, which usually stood him in pretty good stead for kicking ass, as you might imagine.

On this occasion, though, we were in some trouble: The Liberators' foes had remained largely proof against the attacks we'd mustered thus far, and anything more impressive Magni might try ran the risk of extensive collateral damage.

Then, another of our number realized (in game) precisely what we were fighting: Toons, a la Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

Magni promptly opened a dimensional rift with his hammer and disappeared. His compatriots for a time thought he'd abandoned them, and the situation grew dire. Then, when all hope seemed lost, a powerful voice resounded through the sky:

"HERE I COME TO SAVE THE DAY!"

Magni, realizing that only a Toon could properly deal with a Toon (without resorting to absurd levels of power, that is), had entered the Toon dimension and returned with, you guessed it, Mighty Mouse.

You should have seen those evil Toons panic when MM showed up to whup 'em!

[He blushed when Liberty Belle—a unique character in the mold of Captain America, not the DC version—said he was cute, and gave him a little kiss on the forehead. ]

You don't put bumper stickers on Ferraris. You don't put graffiti on a church. By the same ironclad reasoning, you don't put a tattoo on a beautiful woman.

I don't have a specific story, just a general happy memory of the ol' days when me and my two brothers played AD&D. We had this one character who was just a blast to play and GM for. Male Elf, fighter/magic-user, high level, demigodlike power... and a hopeless ditz. His name was Oompoe. He'd follow our stealthing thief around, but the bells on his pointy boots would give away their position. He was constantly the source of friendly fire casualties. No one ever got mad because everyone was in on the joke and even fed him opportunities to bungle spectacularly.

Midgard 1880, set on a steam ship A nice young lady challenged a chess champion and he got kinda grumps, so when she walked on the deck of the ship the man tripped her with his walking stick. Our engineer, who really liked that girl, sprinted forward, helped her up and said: "Yeah, that was mean, I saw that man poke his stick between your legs..."

German fantasy game, the group stands at a riddle door. The sailor, who has a monkey, says: "I'll throw the monkey at the door." He meant he wanted the monkey to climb around on it and hopefully trigger some sort of hidden mechanism. Well, I ruled that he threw the monkey at the door, there was a sickening thud and the monkey ran away limping. Ever since then, whenever the player creates a new character for a game, we suggest he takes the skill "Throwing weapons: Monkey". It sounds more fun in German, though: "Wurfwaffen Affen".

Life is very similar to boxing. Defeat is not declared when you fall down. It's declared when you can no longer get up.

Some people just want to watch the world burn... not because of the pretty colors but because after the fire, there comes rejuvination.

I wouldn't, I've seen DM's do much worse...there was a player who came in late to a game that didn't here the entire layout of a situation (to wit: the village encountered was located next to a sheer cliff), in order to escape the attacking villagers the player in question cut the top off of one of the huts to ride "down the slope" to safety. DM's ruling...you just jumped to your death off a thousand foot cliff.

I give full credit to the player, he didn't even complain when the situation was explaied...his comment was "I said my character did it, he did it."

The overall game was a little strange...there was one player who had the DISTINCTION of never having been killed by a party enemy...he had been killed multiple times by his own party.

It was also the only game where (& this is actually true) I had anaudience.

The player who jumped off the cliff...was invited to roll up a new character of comprable level etc. He declined & said "I'll just watch him (referring to me) play". The next week he brought a friend & another player dropped out to "watch him (me)".

I'd say that makes that DM a colossal jackass, and RIP, in the situation she related, just a bit of a jerk.

Speaking about being a bit of a jerk... Nah nevermind not worth it.

Well, I am sure we all have unpleasant DM experiences to tell stories abot. Like the DM who didn't like anyone having better PCs than his own and would kill any and all when it was his time to DM. My warrior died in bed of a disease without any chance of a cure because the DM had closed the city gates and we would've needed herbs from the outside.

Or the one who had not given us full account of our surroundings, speaking of a "slope" and indicating that the adventure would continue once we'd climbed down. She gave us bad odds to roll the deeper we went down and then described how steep it was. Even the mountaneer died, you know the guy who had taken all the climbing related skills. He made his roll on mountaineering, too, still he felt it was safe to go down there, apparently.

But this thread isn't about bad DM memories as far as I can tell.

So here's another fun little story. We were playing Hackmaster, an AD&D offspring. I was playing a Pixie Fairy about a foot tall, a magic user. We had caught a half orc robber and were going to bring him to the nearest keep to get him to prison. Once we were at the gates, though, the PCs began arguing who got to hand the prisoner over. Over this argument, they forgot to hold on to the guy who was splitting as fast as he could. Now a foot-tall fairy doesn't stand much chance of stopping a grown half-orc but I was the only one faster than him, flying and all. The DM laughed as I said I was going to stop him. I "greased" the street beneath his feet. He slipped and rolled head first against a tree. The argument of who got to hand the guy over then turned to an argument of who had to carry him. It turned out that grease really was an awesome spell, too. Had lots of fun with that one. Like greasing the pillar the giant snake was clinging to in hopes of attacking us from above. Squeeeeeeeee... plonk... dead snake. Or flying up to a big orc leader, making farting sounds and putting grease in his pants, making him feel like he soiled himself. He went running and so went his gang

Life is very similar to boxing. Defeat is not declared when you fall down. It's declared when you can no longer get up.

Some people just want to watch the world burn... not because of the pretty colors but because after the fire, there comes rejuvination.

I'd say that makes that DM a colossal jackass, and RIP, in the situation she related, just a bit of a jerk.

Speaking about being a bit of a jerk ... nah, never mind, not worth it.

Evidently worth enough to say it without saying it.

To be frank, I was not intending any insult with that comment, which is why I qualified it so much and included an "out." I was simply, as a DM of three decades plus experience, commenting on another DM's handling of a game situation ... and, again, not making a personal attack.

Goodness knows, I was a bit of a jerk more than once while DMing.

Sorry for the misunderstanding. Considering our history, I probably shouldn't have hazarded a comment that could be even remotely construed as a personal disparagement.

Moving on ... Grease is actually considered by most modern players to be an awesome utilitarian spell, so you were ahead of your time. Your uses of it were quite innovative, as well. I love when people play spell casters that don't think Fireball is the answer to everything. Kudos.

You don't put bumper stickers on Ferraris. You don't put graffiti on a church. By the same ironclad reasoning, you don't put a tattoo on a beautiful woman.

Yeah, grease was fun. I played a co-player's cleric in that group one day he wasn't around. Usually the character would only heal sometimes and elsehow smash things with his mace. That night he made the fighter who was afraid of heights go down into a basket that would take her deep into a mine with the command "in!" and then just lowering her before she could get out. Sure enough it cost him a black eye once he got down but it worked out okay. This got me thinking that "Command" is also one of those underestimated spells in the spellbook.

Once hubby played a wizard in ars magica and he made a guy burst into flames (literally). The guy was one of the big bads in the adventure. We cheered. Then he went to a cave where he knew he could find (and save) us. He had a torch with him but with his magical power somewhat drained after that magnificent spell, he sat down and used flint and stone to ignite the torch.

Life is very similar to boxing. Defeat is not declared when you fall down. It's declared when you can no longer get up.

Some people just want to watch the world burn... not because of the pretty colors but because after the fire, there comes rejuvination.

The LARP story I remember best is a "bridge simulation". So it's just the bridge (4 to 7 players) and the viewscreen, everything that comes from outside is written down, show or said by the game master(s).

I don't know, why I remember this particular story arc, as it is not the most complicated or thrilling I ever played, but somehow it stuck in my mind. So here's how it went down:

Before the start of the mission, we got briefed on the ships details and on a VIP, that would come aboard and "help" us with our important freight, which was a religious statue of such dimensions, it had to be hooked up by tractor beam. Our mission was to bring it to a newly colonized moon and drop it in orbit, where it was supposed to be seen from the surface.

As we came to the moon however, we discovered an interesting thing: The moon was in fact colonized by the people of our VIP on board, but the planet it orbited around was inhabited by a pre-warp civilization incapable of talking to us (not to mention the prime directive).

Anyhow: The VIP on board, revealing himself as the religious leader of his people, demanded us for the sake of good relations between his planet and the federation to drop the statue a little short of the moon, so his people could get it exactly right. And as we looked on our sensors, there were hundreds of small shuttles (about workbee-size) flying by and watching the event.

So we dropped the package a little short of it's destination and those shuttles used hundreds of tractor beams to pull the statue where it was suppose to go - at first. But then suddenly everything went wrong: The small ships changed course and headed to the planet. It was obvious to us, they were up to something, but our VIP guest didn't give any clue but "it all happens as it should".

Time for the team talk: andorian chief of security suggests using superior firepower to gain back control, counselor votes for not interferring with their beliefs, vulcan XO recites starfleet order to drop the thing in orbit of the moon. In the end, the captain decides to let go and give in to the "priest" on our bridge, that now begs for letting the right things happen.

But our captain was out of luck that day. The statue was not for religious purposes, but for warfare. As soon as it touched the athmosphere it sprayed out a poisonous substance all over the planet, elliminating the pre-warp but not-primitive culture. It's needless to say, the "prayers's" people were immun to said poison. At this point our instructors aborted the simulation.

And as it was a game-in-the-game simulation and alle of the bridge crew were cadets on our Academy LARP, there was an important moral to that story: Orders are orders. Follow them to the letter or face the consequences!